Pushing my thinking forward…and maybe yours too

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Starting With ‘Why?’

For the last few weeks our students have been my inspiration for my Nudges, even more specifically I’ve focused on our Year 10 students of late. They’ve done some inspiring work recently with their Personal Projects and shown a strong passion for learning. This week, however, I want to ask you to turn the mirror on yourself and think about your ‘why’.

If, for just one more moment, we think about those Year 10 students and ask “why did they put so much time and effort into their Personal Projects” we’re going to come back with a lot of different reasons as to ‘why’. Maybe they are passionate about the topic and loved investigating, maybe it was because they wanted a good mark, or perhaps it was to impress their teachers or their parents. Surely each and every one of those kids, at the end of the day, has their own ‘why’.

So, back to you, what’s your ‘why’? Why do you come in each and every day and give everything you have to working with (pre-)teenagers? I’m sure you’ve been asked this before, by friends, family or even strangers. What was your answer to them?

There’s a wonderful TedTalk by Simon Sinek, a motivational speaker and marketing consultant. My Nudge today is has two parts. Part One: Take about 18 minutes to stop and listen to this TedTalk (you can add Indonesian subtitles if you feel like that will help).

Now that you’ve watched that TedTalk I want to encourage you to take some time to contemplate the second portion of this week’s Nudge. Take a piece of paper and draw those three circles: Why, How and What. Start with your ‘Why’. Make a list of all the ‘whys’ that you teach. Why do you teach? Then, move out to the next ring and answer the question, “How do I teach?” From there continue on to the “What do I teach?” Be sure to start with the Why and end with the What.

If you really take your time and are honest with yourself throughout this process I think that you’ll come to some interesting conclusions. Next week I’ll be writing about our Year 10 Work Experience Week but in two weeks’ time I’ll share my results from when I went through this practice with myself. It’s a great time of the year for reflection, we’re asking our kids to do it and we should too…enjoy 🙂